The Wizard Of Oz (MGM film)
The Wizard Of Oz is an American musical fantasy film based on the children's novel, The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz by L. Frank Baum. Notable for its use of special effects, Technicolor, fantasy storytelling and unusual characters, it has become, over the years, one of the best known of all films. The film is mostly in Technicolor, but its opening and closing sequences are in sepia-tinted black-and-white, including all of the film's credits. It was directed primarily by Victor Fleming. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but there were uncredited contributions by others. The lyrics for the songs were written by E.Y. Harburg, the music by Harold Arlen. Incidental music, based largely on the songs, was by Herbert Stothart, with borrowings from classical composers. Although the film received largely positive reviews, it was not a huge box office success on its initial release, earning only $3,017,000 on a $2,000,000 budget. The film was MGM's most expensive production up to that time, but its initial release failed to recoup the studio's investment. Subsequent re-releases made up for that, however. It was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It lost that award to Gone With The Wind, but won two others, including Best Original Song for "Somewhere, Over The Rainbow". The film was released in theaters on August 25, 1939.Telecasts of the film began on November 3, 1956, re-introducing the film to the public and eventually becoming an annual tradition starting on December 13, 1959, making it one of the most famous films ever made. The film was named the most-watched motion picture in history by the Library of Congress, is often ranked among the Top 10 Best Movies of All Time in various critics' and popular polls, and is the source of many memorable quotes referenced in modern popular culture. Plot Dorothy Gale is a 16-year-old orphaned farm girl who lives a simple life in rural sepia-tinted black-and-white Kansas with her Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and three colorful farmhands: lunk-headed Hunk Andrews, seemingly cold-hearted Hickory Twicker, and blustery-but-timid Zeke. When the Gales' cruel neighbor, Almira Gulch, is bitten by Dorothy's pet cairn terrier, Toto, she gets a sheriff's order and takes him away to be destroyed, this causes Dorothy to long for a land, which is somewhere over the rainbow. Toto escapes and returns to Dorothy who fears for his life and runs away with him. Dorothy soon encounters a traveling fortune teller named Professor Marvel, who guesses she has run away and tells her fortune. He convinces her to return home by falsely telling her that Aunt Em has fallen ill from grief. With a tornado fast approaching, she rushes back to the farmhouse, but is unable to join her family in the locked storm cellar. Taking shelter inside the house, she seeks safety in her bedroom, but is knocked unconscious when a window frame blown in by the twister, hits her in the head. She begins dreaming. Then, the tornado lifts up the farmhouse from its foundation without demolishing it and it whirls around two or three times and rises slowly through the air, as it twirls upward until it reaches the clouds and is sucked into the heart of the tornado. As Dorothy awakens, she feels as if she is going up in a balloon, and is surprised to find the house being carried away by the tornado. Inside the storm outside the window, she sees an elderly lady who is knitting calmly in a rocking chair, several farm animals, two men rowing a boat who doff their hats to her, and Miss Gulch, still pedaling her bicycle, who transforms into a cackling witch flying on a broomstick. The farmhouse begins to spin and twirl in the air uncontrollably and the tornado finally releases and drops it, Dorothy screams with fright as the house is falling with gravity as it descends from the sky and crashes back onto the ground. Moments later, Dorothy opens the door and finds herself alone in a strange village in the full three-strip Technicolor world of Oz. Arriving in a floating bubble, Glinda the good witch of the north, informs her that her house landed on and killed the wicked witch of the east. The timid munchkins come out of hiding to celebrate the witch's demise by singing. Their celebration is interrupted when the wicked witch of the west suddenly appears in a cloud of smoke and tries to claim her dead sister's powerful ruby slippers. But Glinda magically transfers them onto Dorothy's feet and reminds the witch of the west that her power is ineffectual in Munchkinland. She tells Dorothy "I'll get you, my pretty...and your little dog, too!" before vanishing. When Dorothy asks how to get back home, Glinda advises her to seek the help of the mysterious wizard of Oz in the emerald city, which she can reach by following the yellow brick road, and warns her never to remove the ruby slippers. On her way to the city, Dorothy meets a scarecrow, a tin man, and a cowardly lion, whose faces resemble those of the farmhands, and they lament that they lack respectively a brain, a heart, and courage. The three decide to accompany her in hopes that the wizard will also fulfill their desires, although they demonstrate that they already have the qualities they believe they lack: the scarecrow has several good ideas, the tin man is kind and sympathetic, and the lion is terrified, though he is ready to face danger. After Dorothy and the lion nearly succumb to one of the witch's traps, the quartet enters the emerald city as the townspeople do plenty of work in a beauty salon to freshen them up to go see the wizard. In getting their makeovers, the scarecrow gets re-stuffed with brand new straw, the tin man gets his body very well polished to remove the rust from it, Dorothy gets her hair let down out of its pigtails and partially tied up with a hair bow, along with a subtly more puffed up dress, and the lion gets a permanent and ribbon for his mane and his claws clipped. The four friends do eventually get see the wizard, who appears as a disembodied, intimidating head. In a booming voice, he states that he will consider granting their wishes if they bring him the wicked witch's broomstick. The group then departs for the witch's castle, and while they are on their way to there, the wicked witch detects them and dispatches her army of flying monkeys who attack them and carry Dorothy and Toto away and deliver them to the witch who demands the ruby slippers. When Dorothy refuses, the witch threatens to drown Toto, so Dorothy agrees to give up the slippers, and the witch tries to remove them but is prevented by a shower of sparks, as she realizes the shoes cannot be removed as long as Dorothy is alive and plots on how to destroy her without damaging the shoes' spell. The witch snarls to Dorothy and runs over to a large hourglass filled with blood-red sand and turns it over, gleefully telling Dorothy "That's how much longer you`ve got to be alive." She puts the hourglass down, runs out of the chamber, and locks Dorothy inside. Sobbing, Dorothy calls for Aunt Em saying she is frightened, Aunt Em appears, and Dorothy tries to tell her that she is trying to get home, then the witch appears as she begins mocking and laughing at Dorothy. Toto escapes and leads Dorothy's companions to the castle. After overpowering some winkie guards and disguising themselves in their uniforms, they free her. The witch and the winkies corner the group on a parapet, where she sets the scarecrow's arm ablaze. Dorothy throws water on her friend and accidentally splashes the witch, causing her to melt. The winkies are delighted, and their captain gives Dorothy the broomstick. Upon their return to the wizard's chamber, Toto opens a curtain, revealing the wizard to be an a normal old man with no real magical powers. Apologetic, he explains that Dorothy's companions already possess what they have been seeking all along, but bestows upon them tokens of esteem in recognition of them and gives the scarecrow a diploma, the lion a medal, and the tin man a heart-shaped clock. Also born in Kansas, he was brought to Oz by a runaway hot air balloon. He offers to take Dorothy home in the same balloon, leaving the scarecrow, tin man, and lion in charge of the emerald city. As they are about to leave, Toto jumps right out of Dorothy's arms to chase after a Siamese cat with blue eyes who is meowing at him in the crowd, so Dorothy rushes off after her dog, not wanting to leave him. The wizard, unable to control the balloon, leaves without her. Dorothy is devastated and begins to cry as her three friends try comfort her, as she tells everyone that she may never see Aunt Em again and doesn't know what to do. The lion suggests for Dorothy to live in Oz, but she tells him that Oz will never be like Kansas. Glinda appears and tells her that she always had the power to return home to Kansas: the ruby slippers will take her will take her back home in two seconds. She previously did not tell Dorothy this because Dorothy had to realize for herself that there's no place like home. After saying her goodbyes to her friends in Oz and following Glinda's instructions, Dorothy closes her eyes, taps her heels together three times, and repeats "There's no place like home". Instantly the farmhouse whirls through the air, so swiftly that all Dorothy can see or feel is the wind whistling past her ears, as the ruby slippers transport Dorothy and the house back to the farm in Kansas. During Dorothy's return trip home, she remembers various moments during her journey in the land of Oz. When the farmhouse falls to the ground again, it leaves her in bed with having taken a bump on her head. She awakens in her bedroom, surrounded by her family, the three farmhands and Professor Marvel. She claims the farmhands and Professor Marvel were in Oz, and tells them of her adventures. This means that Miss Gulch may possibly have died in the tornado, in conjunction with the deaths of the wicked witches of Oz. A happy Dorothy hugs Toto and says, "Oh, Auntie Em, there's no place like home!" Cast of characters Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale Frank Morgan as Professor Chester Marvel / the doorman / the cabbie / the guard / the wizard of Oz Ray Bolger as Hunk Andrews / the scarecrow Jack Haley as Hickory Twicker / the tin man Bert Lahr as Zeke / the cowardly lion Billie Burke as Glinda the good witch of the north Margaret Hamilton as Miss Almira Gulch / Gulcheria the wicked witch of the west Clara Blandick as Aunt Emily Gale Charley Grapewin as Uncle Henry Gale Pat Walshe as Nikko the head flying monkey Terry as Toto the Singer midgets as the munchkins Jerry Maren as the lollipop kid munchkin Mitchell Lewis as the winkie guard captain Trivia In L. Frank Baum's original novel, the land of Oz is a very dark, gruesome, dangerous, and frightening fairyland full of dark dreams and scary villains, and it is a real place where Dorothy and her family eventually go to live forever. In addition to this, Dorothy is a little 5-year-old girl, the good witch of the north is unnamed and old wrinkled, the wicked witch of the west has one eye which is as powerful as a telescope and can see all parts of the land of Oz no matter how far off it is and wears an eye patch on the other, Glinda is the very beautiful and young looking good witch of the south, the scarecrow receives a brain made out of bran, pins, and needles, the tin man is given a stuffed satin heart put into his chest and then patched over with tin, the lion getting a large bowl filled with green liquid which he drank up and it makes him fearless and full of courage, and silver shoes with pointed toes only have the power of teleportation. This classic musical film version only tells a small portion of the story, and is a very loosely based adaptation of the novel, because Oz was changed into a light, candy-coated, and full three-strip Technicolor dream world with happy go-lucky images of a very safe place where many of the characters that Dorothy meets represent the people from her home life, which was induced by a bump on her head. Some of the other differences include: Dorothy being a 16-year-old damsel in distress who needs to be rescued, Glinda as a middle-aged looking witch who wears a glittering light pink ball gown and travels in a magical bubble, the wicked witch of the west is a green-skinned witch who wears all black and flies on a broomstick in the sky, the scarecrow receiving a diploma, the tin man being given a a heart-shaped clock that ticks, the lion getting a medal that says Courage, and the ruby slippers with bows have more powers attributed to them, since they cannot be taken off unless through death, and were even able to send volts of electricity out to shock the wicked witch's fingers before she was even able to touch them. When MGM bought the rights to L. Frank Baum's novel, "The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz," they also purchased the rights to the 1902 vaudeville-style stage musical by Baum and Paul Tietjen and The Wizard Of Oz, Larry Semon's 1925 failed silent comedy The writers had proposed many odd ideas and created new incidents to liven up the story in very different previous versions of the script because the original idea was to turn the story into a slapstick musical comedy, so there were a few deviations from what was written in the book. This was possibly an idea MGM may have borrowed for the movie after buying the rights to the 1925 film version of The Wizard Of Oz which had a character named Dorothy living in Kansas and a house transported to Oz via cyclone, but the resemblance to the book ends there. When the script got too bogged down, they would turn to Baum's book for inspiration and the results were generally an improvement, so it could be seen as a triumph that the final results are as close to the book as they are! None of the Kansas scenes or the tornado scene were shown in the original trailer in order to give the impression that the whole film was in full Technicolor, and it also falsely claimed that every scene from Baum's novel was in the film, including "the rescue of Dorothy" though there is no such incident in the novel The scarecrow's face makeup that Ray Bolger wore consisted of a foam rubber mask that was textured with a woven pattern to look like burlap cloth, it also holes cut out for his eyes and mouth Jack Haley did not use his normal voice when playing the tin man, only when playing Hickory, and it contains none of the falsetto-like quality that the tin man's did A sequel using the original cast was greenlighted, but scrapped after Judy Garland became such a big star and Margaret Hamilton expressed doubts over the feasibility of such a project Judy Garland received an honorary pint-sized Oscar Award in 1940, which she later referred to as the Munchkin Award, it was given to her as "an outstanding performance as a screen juvenile during the past year" for her role of Dorothy Gale The Wizard Of Oz was dramatized as a one-hour radio play on the Lux Radio Theater on December 25, 1950 with Judy Garland reprising her earlier role Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice wrote a musical based on the film, which features all of the songs from the film plus new songs, it opened in 2011 at the West End's London Palladium To tie in with its sponsorship of the 1965 telecast of film, Procter & Gamble offered plastic Oz hand puppets as premiums with laundry products Zest, Downy, and Top Job On their 25th wedding anniversary, Bert Lahr's wife surprised him with a first edition copy of Baum's The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz, which she found at an auction The film was first shown on television as the last installment of the CBS anthology series Ford Star Jubilee on November 3, 1956. This marked the only time that one of the film's actual actors as well as one of the children of the film's star had hosted it. Ironically, Judy Garland's first TV special "The Judy Garland Show" aired as the very first broadcast of Ford Star Jubilee on September 24, 1955.Category:Movies Category:The Wizard Of Oz